So how many civilians and soldiers died at Nanking battle? One can attempt to estimate by Nanking population and the burial record.
¶ Nanking population
In Nanking, the capital of Republic of China, there were many people living there. But before the battle, many of them evacuated as archived by Westerners.
This simply proves that no evidence that 200K or 300K people were killed. One might say, “ then people in the proximity of Nanking were killed”, but no such witness or proof that Japanese killed that many people outside of Nanking while Chinese KMT burned down many houses and buildings and killed many Chinese civilians.
¶ Burial Record
After the end of battle on Dec1937, Japanese authority hired Chinese burial team, Red Swastika to collect all bodies to bury to clean the city and the other charity organizations collected too.
Then would it be easy to estimate the death toll? No. It is always subject to a forgery. After World War 2, at Far East trial, Republic of China brought the new burial record to accuse Japan which is not the one originally made in 1938 within a year after Nanking battle. Instead, Republic of China submitted a list of new burial groups that were never mentioned by Westerners(Safety zone committee) or Japanese, and they had an appallingly much bigger body count 260K than Westerners ever described with max 40K back then. The number 260K is conveniently almost the same as the sum of Hiroshima 140K + Nagasaki 75K = 210K atomic bomb victims.
IMTFE source burial record (Chong shan tang is only partial)
IMTFE source burial record for Chong shan tang
Japanese 崇善堂 法廷証第325号: 南京大虐殺に関する統計表/ 南京市崇善堂堂長周一漁
Japanese 紅卍字会 法廷証番号326: 世界紅卍字会南京分会救援隊埋葬班埋葬死体数統計表
Total burial records (rewritten from below)
| Group | number | Mentioned by Safety zone committee | chart record |
| Tsung-shan-tang (Chong shan tang) 崇善堂 | 112266 | - | Yes |
| Red Swastika 紅卍字会 | 43071 | Yes | Yes |
| Shia Kwan District | 26100 | - | - |
| Stated by Mr. Lu Su | 57400 | - | - |
| Stated by Massrp. Jui, Chang, and Young | 7000 or more | - | - |
| Stated by Mr. Wu | 2000 or more | - | - |
| Epitaph on the Tomb of Unknown Victims | 3000 or more | - | - |
| TOTAL-- Approximately | 260000 dead |
The photos of burial records submitted at Far East trial (note: no proof that these are the original made in 1938)
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Above them, only two groups, Chong shan tang 崇善堂 ( burial count: 112266 ) and Red Swastika 紅卍字会 (burial count: 43071) come with their charts of records submitted to the trial. The rest is only a number and not reliable.
Therefore let's focus on only these two and search more.
As shown below, Red Swastika had been mentioned so often by Westerners such as John Rabe, Vautrin, Bates, and Japanese while Chong shan tang was never mentioned. Is it possible Chong shan tang had been ignored when it had more than double death toll of Red Swastika??
The list of Red Swastika mentioned by Westerners/Japanese
| 1937/9/26 | John Rabe | Diary amazon |
| 1937/12/8 | John Rabe | Diary |
| 1937/12/16 | John Rabe | Diary |
| 1938/2/7 | John Rabe | Diary |
| 1938/2/10 | John Rabe | Diary |
| 1938/2/10 | Vautrin | Diary amazon |
| 1938/2/15 | John Rabe | Diary |
| 1938/3/21 | Bates | "Notes on the Present Situation" source NMP0225 |
| 1938/4/2 | Vautrin | Diary |
| 1938/4/6 | Vautrin | Diary |
| 1938/4/15 | Vautrin | Diary |
| 1938/4/16 |
Japanese newspaper, Osaka Asahi Hokushi version 大阪朝日新聞北支版 |
Submitted to court (Japanese) source
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Let's take a look at charts of these two groups shown below, you get more suspicious them.
Chong shan tang 崇善堂 chart
Apparently from April at suburb(See the red underlines below), suddenly they collected more than 20K bodies per two weeks, a lot faster than they did . How is it possible? There is no such record they hired extra people to speed up their jobs. This has been often criticized making Chong shan tang questionable.
To learn further, see Chinese and Japanese documents.
Chong shan tang Chart 崇善堂
(7548 +104718 = 112266 death toll)
Red Swastika Chart
If you look at Red Swastika Chart below, it is more elaborate and plausible (except a red line 28th Dec) than Chong shan tang. Red Swastika has been cited by Westerners and its total count 40K has been mentioned by Bates before WW2. Another thing you notice when comparing these two charts, you find Red Swastika has the very low female(pink)/children(yellow) body count compared to Chong Shan tang even when you limit to the inside the city for both. Statistically is it possible Red Swastika happened to be at spots all the time where there are only a few female and children bodies while Chong Shang tang was not?
Red Swastika Chart 紅卍字会
(43072 death toll)
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So you come to the conclusion below.
| Conclusion 1 The record by Red Swastika is the only reliable and consistent source and the one by Chong shan tang is not. Even if Chong shan tang had engaged in a burial activity, the body count would be much smaller (extremely exaggerated). |
But is it ok to submit a false proof to a court? Well, sadly after all this is war winner trial. As shown below, it doesn't require to show any proof of evidence. This is in a way just a performance or the extension of war.
d. Judicial Notice. The Tribunal shall neither require proof of facts of common knowledge, nor of the authenticity of official government documents and reports of any nation proceedings, records, and findings of military or other agencies of any of the United Nations.
Now we only focus on Red Swastika record with 40K burial count.
How many bodies among 43072 were civilians? Bates and Vautrin seem to believe a great number of bodies were from civilians believing that what Red Swastika team told them. But apparently there is a contradiction. As it was pointed out, The female (83) or Children (46) body count is small, the rate of female and children is only (83+46)/43072= 0.3%. This is much smaller than Gulf War. Even if we assume the male civilians were just as many as female, then (83+83+46)/43072=0.5%. Still low.
How did Red Swastika knew whether individual bodies were from civilians or not when Chinese KMT soldiers took off their uniforms and worn civilian’s? Or had there happen to be many male civilians in Nanking?
We also need to consider following.
1. There were KMT female soldiers in Nanking. Female body doesn’t mean she is civilian.
2. We don't know how people died, we only count bodies. KMT killed many civilians. People accidentally got killed in a battle too.
| Conclusion 2 Red Swastika record shows the female/children body rate is only 0.3% . It suggests these 40K bodies were soldiers'. The cause of female/children death is unknown. KMT might’ve killed these people or they got killed accidentally on a battle. |
The last thing we consider is the credibility of Red Swastika count even if it had been made in 1938. If you look at the “Dec 28 1937 (a red underline)" in Red Swastika chart, it has an unusually big count, 6468, and it says all over the city.
The other resource says, that day, Dec 28th, was heavily snowy. Is it possible to collect unusually many count especially on snowy day? Interestingly Japanese officer responsible for hiring a burial group said, he didn’t much care about Red Swastika’s report even when he knew they added extra count of bodies to make money, since his job priority is to finish to clean up a city as soon as possible before a parade and ceremony began. He estimated the actual body count is only about 24K not 43072.
| Conclusion 3 Red Swastika record 40K made in 1938 was also exaggerated by its team to make more money from Japanese, and the actual body count can be estimated as only 12K not 43072. |